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Richard Thompson, NOLA.com | The Times-Picayune

About Me:

I cover the oil and gas industry,
alternative energy and electric utilities, including Entergy Corp. I also write about issues impacting the region’s maritime
community. I can be reached at rthompson@nola.com or (504) 826.3496.

The head of Transocean Ltd., which leased its Deepwater Horizon drilling rig and supplied its crew to BP to drill the ill-fated Macondo well, testified Tuesday that the Swiss company agreed to plead guilty and pay $1.4 billion in penalties for its role in the 2010 Gulf of Mexico oil spill because the rig's crew members "should have done... Full story »

A well-control expert testified Monday in the massive civil trial to determine liability for the BP oil spill that Transocean crew members on the Deepwater Horizon drilling rig "had the training that was necessary to understand" a basic well-control situation and to react to it. He also said BP workers should have recognized problem signs pointing to a potential... Full story »

Transocean, which leased its Deepwater Horizon drilling rig and supplied its crew to BP to drill the Macondo well, began presenting its defense Monday in the sprawling civil trial to determine liability for the 2010 Gulf of Mexico oil spill. The federal trial has now entered its fourth week. Testimony during the first three weeks of the trial, presented... Full story »

The massive civil trial to determine liability for the 2010 Gulf of Mexico oil spill shifted its focus last week from BP, the owner of the Macondo well, to its partners in the ill-fated drilling operation. Turning the spotlight on Transocean and Halliburton was, legal experts and others following the case say, likely a welcome change for the British... Full story »

The lead lawyer for Halliburton, the company that supplied cement to seal the ill-fated BP Macondo well, told a federal court Thursday that the oil field services giant has found leftover samples of a cement slurry at its lab in Lafayette that may be from the same mixture used to seal the well. Halliburton lawyer Don Godwin made the... Full story »

Joseph Keith, a mud logger for Halliburton's Sperry Sun unit, testified Wednesday in the 11th day of the BP trial that he took a smoke break and missed a "kick" of natural gas an hour before the April 20, 2010 blowout of BP's Macondo well and the explosion and fire aboard the Deepwater Horizon drilling rig. And a marine... Full story »

The cement slurry used to seal the ill-fated BP Macondo well "had a low probability of success," a Halliburton executive who served as head of its cementing operations at the time of the 2010 Deepwater Horizon disaster testified Tuesday in the BP spill trial. Thomas Roth, who now serves as global operations manager for Halliburton's Boots & Coots pressure... Full story »

Halliburton's president for strategic and corporate development testified Monday that he was "aware of some irregularities" in the company's testing of the quality of the cement slurry from the ill-fated Macondo oil well after the blowout. But Timothy Probert, who headed Halliburton's safety program at the time of the 2010 spill, did not specify what the irregularities were. Plaintiffs'... Full story »

An engineer who helped conduct a forensic analysis of the Deepwater Horizon's blowout preventer for the Department of Justice continued his testimony Monday in the BP oil spill trial. Rory Davis, who was on a team of engineers put together by the California-based Talas Engineering, first took the stand on Thursday and was cross-examined by BP attorneys Monday. U.S.... Full story »

Under intense questioning Thursday, BP's safety chief testified that the team that conducted an internal investigation into the Macondo blowout did not weigh concerns that the ill-fated oil well was over-budget and behind schedule, nor did they reach out to a former company executive who reportedly resigned months earlier over safety concerns in its offshore drilling operations. Mark Bly,... Full story »

BP and its two main contractors, Transocean and Halliburton, are the primary defendants in Gulf oil spill trial scheduled to start Monday. But lots of legal issues have been settled since the 2010 disaster. Here is a primer on what has happened so far and what each company still has at stake. BP Role: Held the lease on the... Full story »

The BP oil spill trial, which begins Monday, will involve dozens of high-profile attorneys on both sides of the aisle. Here are the lead litigators who are expected to be the major players during the trial's first phase. Attorneys for the state of Alabama will represent the interests of all of the states involved, including Louisiana, Mississippi, Florida and... Full story »